As you flip through the pages of last year’s hit novel “Hidden Figures,” you’ll find countless names of women who helped NASA in the race to space – but one, in particular, has special meaning at Rutgers University-Camden.

Ida Bassette was a native of Hampton, Virginia and worked alongside Dorothy Vaughan (portrayed by Octavia Spencer in the movie adaptation) as a “computer” in the West Campus of NASA Langley. She later became a shift supervisor along with Vaughan and eventually made the move with her family to Passaic, New Jersey. There, she became a public school teacher and raised a daughter who went on to become the current Chancellor of Rutgers University-Camden: Phoebe Haddon.